Renewable bearing supports



June 26, 1962 T. H. SLOAN RENEWABLE BEARING SUPPORTS 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed May 25, 1960 INVENTOR. y' vfov 5 1m y V/ HWNPAAAVIIIIIIIIIA June 26, 1962 T. H. SLOAN 3,040,483

RENEWABLE BEARING SUPPORTS Filed May 25, 1960 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Rig. 7

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3,040,4s3 RENEWABLE BEARING surronrs =Theodore H. Sloan, P0. Box '58, Charleroi, Pa., assignor of one-fourth, to William B. .Iaspert, Upper St. Clair, Pennsylvania Filed May 25, 1960, Ser. No. 31,665 5 Claims. (Cl. 51-154) This invention relates to new and useful improvements in bearing supports, more particularly to renewable hearing supports for use in honing machines, centerless grinding machines and the like.

The instant application is a continuation-in-part of a co-pending application Serially Numbered 854,740, filed November 23, 1959 issued as Patent No. 3,021,648 on February 20, 1962 for Method and Apparatus for Honing Cylindrical Bodies, which is a continuation-in-part of application Serial-1y Numbered 759,798 filed September 8, 1958 issued as Patent No. 2,938,308 on May 31, 1960 for Machines for Honing Parts of Anti-Friction Bearings and the like. In the former application, rollers for anti-friction roller bearings are fed to a pair of pinch rolls which engage the rollers to rotate the same while they are being finished either by an abrasive stone or honing tape having an abrasive surface in contact with the cylindrical bodies to be honed.

In said earlier application, the roller is supported either on a rail, which is a fixed stationary member of metal or other hard material, or on a supporting roller and in either case, the surface of the rail or the bearing of the roller are subjected to excessive wear because of the pressures exerted by the honing media on the cylindrical body being honed.

Also, the rail or roller support and bearing are exposed to the abrasive floated on their surfaces by the honing oil which causes excessive wear and if an abrasive granule becomes lodged between the roller being honed and a fixed rail surface, it will abrade or score the roller surface until the granule is crushed or flushed out.

In accordance with the present invention, the body to he honed is supported on a flexible tape that is'either continuously moving or moved in increments for each roller to be honed to provide a renewed supporting surface to obtain the high degree of accuracy that is required in the roller bearing art. Any abrasive granules that float in the honing oil or become loose from the abrasive stone or tape would move to the flexible tape and either become imbedded therein or flush out without in any manner marring the roller surface being honed. Another advantage in the use of a compressible tape such as paper is that it would nest the roll if it were bellied in the middle and avoid point contact and instead give line contact along the length of the roll. The axis of the roll being honed would not be disturbed but would remain in a straight horizontal plane so that the roll could be subjected to contour honing by rocking the honing shoe that supports the abrasive honing tape.

By using the compressible supporting tape with the floating shoe for the honing tape, curved surfaces on rollers may be honed.

It is further apparent that by use of a paper tape or other yielding or anti-friction support, the pressure used to hone does not create the friction that results when the rolls are supported on a hardened rail. The power required to operate the pinch rolls is therefore considerably less when a flexible tape material is employed as the roll support. Also, the paper tape support will become oil soaked from the honing oil or it could be treated with a graphite or other material to reduce fric- 2 tion on its supporting surface. Even a metal tape of suitable composition is an advantage over the rail support in that it presents a new supporting surface for each honing operation.

The invention, in one form, also contemplates the use of an abrasive surface on the supporting element for acting upon the surface of the roller it supports, together with an abrasive element acting on the surface opposite to the support to reduce the honing time. Also, one tape can be employed to produce an almost 0 micro finish while the other tape, with a coarser abrasive, can be employed to cut a cross pattern on the roll surface. 7

Roller bearings generally are first ground to size and then honed to the proper surface finish. The surface of the hearing or roll should be nearly zero micro. Such a surface will provide maximum load bearing areas which are necessarily void of oil films to cushion the loads.

It has been found that a hearing surface of nearly zero micro finish, perhaps because of its inability to carry oil, is noisy at high speeds and that surfaces having certain cross hatch patterns or random cross hatch grooves in which oil can flow will eliminate bearing noises. It is therefore another object of the invention to provide a honing medium capable of producing nearly Zero micro surfaces and at the same time apply another abrasive honing medium to produce the cross hatch pattern on the surface that will carry oil.

It is still another object of the invention to provide means of supporting cylindrical bodies that will eliminate wear on the'supporting surface and thereby provide for extreme accuracy in the honing or grinding operation and which shall be adapted for centerless grinding or honing, as the case maybe.

The invention will become more apparent from a consideration of the accompanying drawings constituting a part hereof in which like reference characters designate like parts and in which:

FIGURE 1 is a front elevational view diagrammatically illustrating a pairof pinch rollers for driving a taper roller of a roller bearing and a supporting rail therefor with a renewable supporting surface in the form of a strip or tape passing between the supporting rail and the roller being honed, in accordance with the principles of this invention;

. FIGURE 2 is a vertical cross-sectional View, partially in elevation,taken along the line 22 of FIGURE 1;

FIGURE 3 is a vertical cross-section of a supporting rail taken along the line 3-3 of FIGURE 2; 7

FIGURE 4 is a cross section of an enlarged detail of the roller bearing surface being honed; V

FIGURE 5, a similar View after the surface of FIG- URE 4 has been subjected to a honing operation;

FIGURE 6 is ane'nd elevational view of a tape honing machine utilizing a renewable surface support for the roller being honed;

FIGURE 7 is a view corresponding to the view of FIGURE 1 showing an endless type of renewable surface support such as flexible tape or paper; and,

FIGURE 8 is a View corresponding to a portion of FIGURE 2 showing the invention applied to support a shaft or other cylindrical member for centerless grinding.

In the drawings, the numeral 1 constitutes a machine housing, a side elevation of which is shown in FIGURE 2, partially in cross section, which includes a mounting bracket 2 supported on a base plate 3. A bolt 4 constitutes a stop for a spindle 5 that carries a supporting rail 6 for an anti-friction roller 7 that is to be honed. The roller is fed to the supporting rail by a feed rod 8 3 operated by a mechanism disclosed in my co-pending application Serially .Numbered 854,740, filed November 23, 1959.

Disposed between the anti-friction roller 7 and the rail 6 is a flexible tape designated by the numeral 9, which passes around the rail 6 to which it is fed from a roll 10, FIGURE 1, that is mounted on arm 11 extending from an angle bracket 12 mounted on the machine base 13 that supports the member 1. Guide rolls 14 and 15 provided on the arm 11 guide the flexible tape from the roll 10 and around the rail 6 and back to a drive roll 16 that is driven by motor 17, traction for feeding the tape being supplied by a roller 18 mounted on arm 19 pivoted at 20, tension being supplied by a spring 21. The flexible tape 9 may be rewound as a roll in an obvious manner.

The anti-friction roller 7 is driven by pinch rolls 22 and 23 in any suitable manner, as by the apparatus shown in my aforementioned earlier application.

The rail 6 is provided with a curved face 24 around which the flexible tape moves and a guiding surface 25, FIGURE 3, from which the tape passes to the drive roll 16. The rail itself is slotted, as shown at 26, and provided with a curved face 27 to guide the incoming tape to the curved surface 24. The rail is fastened by screw bolts 28 to a block 29 that is supported on base plate 3. The anti-friction roller 7 to be honed is shown mounted in the manner disclosed in FIGURE 6 beneath a tape honing apparatus generally designated by the reference numeral 30 which is more clearly described in the aforementioned co-pending application. It utilizes a shuttle head that oscillates in a direction axially of the roller 7. The shuttle head is provided with a honing shoe 31 around which an abrasive tape 32 passes with the abrasive surface turned outward to make contact with the upper face of the anti-friction roller 7 when the head is lowered.

The operation of the honing head may be timed with the operation of the tape feeding motor 17, FIGURE 1, so that the tape 9 is advanced in increments to provide a renewed supporting surface each time the work or roller 7 is replaced after each honing operation. Also, the flexible tape can be used in the form of an endless belt and continuously driven while the honing operation is in progress, this construction being shown in FIG- URE 7 of the drawing wherein the flexible tape 9a passes over the supporting rail 6 and over a continuously rotating drive wheel 34 having the same traction roll and mounting as is shown in connection with FIGURE 1. In FIGURE 8, the piece to be honed is a cylindrical shaft 35 which is supported on the flexible tape 9. The shaft 35 is thus supported for centerless grinding or honing, as it is being fed in an axial direction on the renewable flexible tape surface.

Instead of using a relatively soft flexible tape such as a paper tape or any material that presents a smooth bearing surface to the roller 7, a tape having an abrasive surface may be utilized. In FIGURE 6 such an abrasive tape is designated by the reference numeral 36 and passes over the rail 6 in the same manner as described in connection with the supporting tape of FIGURE 1, however, an abrasive surface on the outer face of the tape is exposed to the roller 7 and acts upon the roller to hone the same at the same time that the tape of the honing head 30 is applied to the upper surface of the roller. The result of such double honing action may be demonstrated in connectionwith FIGURES 4 and of the drawing. For example, as shown in FIGURE 4, the honed surface 40 may be of a mirror-like finish as the result of honing by the abrasive tape 32 of a certain fineness of grit or the surface 40 of FIGURE 4 may be provided with fine hatched lines 42 which is in the form of a groove hardly visible to the eye. These grooves 42 are not necessarily annular, but are preferably of a cross hatch pattern or random cross hatch. It has been found that such grooves eliminate bearing noises when the bearings are operated at high speed, presumably so because they are capable of carrying a lubricant through the points of contact between the roll and the cone and the roll and the shell.

By means of the renewable flexible tape supporting surface for supporting cylindrical bodies being honed, as hereinabove described, scores and marks on the pieces operated on resulting from wear of metal rails or supporting rollers are eliminated. This avoids the delay of redressing the supporting rails or replacing supporting rollers and assures extreme accuracy and finish of the surface in the products being honed. It is, of course, apparent that the invention may be employed just as a renewable support for highly finished cylindrical surfaces or as a support and abrasive or finishing medium in the manner described.

Although one embodiment of the invention has been herein illustrated and described, it will be evident to those skilled in the art that various modifications may be made in the details of construction without departing from the principles herein set forth.

Iclaim:-

*1. In a honing machine a work support, a cylindrical work piece supported thereon, a pair of drive rolls mounted for rotation on opposite sides of said cylindrical work piece, each drive roll being mounted on separately driven shafts and each drive roll having pressure contact with the work piece in a radial direction, flexible bearing material disposed between said work piece and said support and means for moving said material to renew the bearing surface thereof.

2. A honing machine as set forth in claim 1 in which the work support has a curved surface and the flexible bearing material is compressible and in the form of a strip mounted for movement over the curved surface of the honing rest.

3. A honing machine as set forth in claim 1 in which the flexible bearing material is a strip of honing tape having an abrasive surface exposed to and in contact with the cylindrical work pieces and means for feeding said tape in increments around the work support.

4. A honing machine as set forth in claim 1 having a honing head above the cylindrical work piece with a shoe around which an abrasive tape passes with the abrasive surface turned outward to make pressure contact with the upper face of the cylindrical work piece to force the same against the flexible bearing material on said work support.

5. A honing machine as set forth in claim 1 in which the work support is a shoe having a' plurality of offset guide portions, one of which forming a slot for directing the flexible bearing material from a supply reel over and around the work support in contact with the cylindrical work piece and away from said work support to a gathering means.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,076,601 Strong Apr. 13, 1937 

